


Cold Comfort

by FabulaRasa



Category: DCU
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-31
Updated: 2014-01-31
Packaged: 2018-01-10 18:09:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1162880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FabulaRasa/pseuds/FabulaRasa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is classic hypothermia fic, and I have no excuses to make, and no regrets. Bruce and Hal must share body heat, and SAT stories.</p><p>See end for link to sequel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cold Comfort

"Stupid," Hal muttered. "How fucking mentally challenged do you have to. . ." And he aimed another useless kick at the rock wall. 

"Stop," Batman said. 

"What, you're afraid I might damage the rock?"

"You're wasting energy." 

"Hang on, I think I can shift the—if I can just get enough—force behind it to—" He strained, throwing all his weight against the massive boulders blocking their way, but it was no good. The glow from the alien hive's reactor was powerful enough it seeped around the crevices of the stones, illumining everything with a ghostly light. Just enough to irradiate them all, probably. Bats was just watching him, sitting with his back against the wall. 

"If you're lucky," he said, "you might shift them enough so they all fall on you. Or if I'm lucky, I should say."

Hal braced his arms on the rock, resting. He would try again in a minute. "It doesn't make any sense," he said for the four-hundredth time. "I charged my ring just last night. I should have complete charge. I don't understand how this can have happened."

"Dampening field," Batman said. "It would be obvious, if you were capable of deductive reasoning."

"If I were _capable_ —Jesus Christ, are you just going to sit there thinking of new and inventive ways to call me stupid? Because Air Force Academy appointments, they don't hand those out to dummies, you know. I had a perfect math score, on the SAT."

"Did you just use your SAT score to argue your intelligence?"

"No, but you were the one who—oh, whatever, forget it. Just forget it. Hand me your belt. You must have some sort of explosives or something in there. Don't even tell me you don't have the entire contents of the Acme Corporation hidden inside that thing."

The blank eyes of the cowl looked at him with incredulous non-blinks. "Explosives. We are trapped in a twenty-five square foot area, surrounded on four sides by rock, and your idea is, we set off an explosion?"

"Okay, fine, grappling hook. Hand me one of those."

"So you can climb to the top of the rock and look at the rest of the rock? Or so you can dislodge enough of the rock to crush us?"

Hal aimed another vicious kick at a boulder. "Stupid," he said again. 

"Stop worrying about the rock and start worrying about the temperature. It's cold in here and getting colder."

Hal frowned, watching the gusts of air from his breath. "Right," he said. "Okay. Well, I'm assuming your suit's insulated."

Batman shook his head, just a curt motion. "Extra weight," he said. "Every ounce matters, when you're using wire to propel yourself through the air. Not all of us can fly."

"Well, my uniform's good in deep space. It shouldn't have any problem in here." 

"How nice for you." 

Hal paced. A frown shouldn't have been visible under that cowl, but somehow it was. "Stupid," he muttered. 

"Your conversation is a little less than scintillating," he rasped, in that annoying Batman voice. 

"Okay," Hal said. "Here's what we can do. We can split the uniform, maybe alternate. Take off the top part of your armor, and put my shirt on. I'll keep the pants, and put on your armor. After twenty minutes, we switch. That way we'll at least keep part of our bodies insulated. And that cape, it's got to be good for something. Hand me that and I'll wrap in it for my top."

Batman looked like he was considering this. "I'm not sure I can," he said.

"Oh for fuck's sake. Seriously, what the _fuck_. You can't release your precious cape for a few minutes, even if it saves both our lives? Or, excuse me, saves _your_ life, because I am just fine."

"That isn't what I meant." Batman's voice was even more tightly clenched now. "I meant, I'm going to need your. . . help." He said the last word like it caused him physical pain. 

"Help with what?"

"I took a hit, between the armor plating. That last round, before the rock formation collapsed."

Hal frowned again, and knelt beside him. All of a sudden his immobility seemed a lot less like apathy, and a lot more like something else. He put a hand to Batman's side, and felt warm and wet. "Jesus Christ," he murmured. "Bruce."

He also felt something else: the small rhythmic tremor in Bruce's muscles. "You're going into shock," he said. "I'm getting you out of this. Will the cape tear?"

He shook his head. "No."

"Okay, I need to see your face. I'm going to shift you, but I need to see how much this is hurting so I know when to stop."

"Fine." But he made no move to push the cowl back, and Hal realized that lifting his arms to remove it might be too painful. 

"I gotcha," Hal said, pushing the heavy thing back. 

Always such a shock to see that face underneath. The piercing eyes under the cowl's flat lenses, the sharply angled face. There was a contusion on the upper left cheekbone. "Okay, try leaning forward, if you can."

He heard from the hitch of breath how much it was hurting him. He was pretty sure Batman's hitch of breath and small frown equaled a normal person's screaming writhe on the floor. He found the catch in the back and released it, and the other on the sides.

"Not bad," Bruce said, and Hal grinned. 

"Plenty of practice with bras in movie theaters."

"I don't think so."

Hal said nothing to that. He lifted away the armor, tossing it behind him. Bruce gasped—the armor must have sealed at least part of the wound. Hal hastily grabbed the cape and pushed it against the dark gush. He pressed as hard as he could, and that was what finally ripped the groan from Bruce.

"Fuck," he panted, turning his head away. Hal had never seen him in pain before. Had never seen him acknowledge pain, never actually heard him swear, and kidding about the vampire thing aside, part of him had always wondered if maybe Bruce was holding out on them, if he did have reserves of super-strength or meta-ability that he drew on when he needed it. Seeing Bruce broken and bleeding—seeing him grind his jaw against the pain—did things to his insides. He had a brief satisfying image of himself ripping the head off one of those purple-blooded creatures, tearing through ligament and bone while it screeched in pain. He pressed harder, and this time Bruce clamped down on the groan in his throat before it made it out.

"Scream if you want," Hal said. "God knows I would be. There's no one to hear you but me."

Bruce just looked away, his eyes steadfastly fixed on something Hal couldn't see. "Okay," he said. "I'm gonna tie the cape around you, like this. My shirt will be a tight fit—you're bigger than me anyway, and the cape will make it really tight. But that might be a good thing. Could be that'll control the bleeding some, until Superman can get to us."

"I'm not sure—he saw where we got cut off," Bruce said.

"Doesn't matter. He'll x-ray the whole area until he finds you. Now if it were just me, maybe he'd go home and grab a sandwich first, maybe come back tomorrow if he had the time. But you? He'd peel the earth's crust down to the magma to find you. So lucky for me, I've got you with me." He pulled off his shirt as he spoke, his skin prickling against the chill. Holy fuck it was cold. 

"Okay, lean forward again, let me try to get this on you. Bruce," he said sharply. "Bruce, stay with me. You cannot fall asleep. Do you hear me? You need to stay conscious."

"I know," he growled. "Stop yelling."

Hal slipped the armor on with fumbling fingers, already going numb. Christ, the temp was dropping fast in here. Quickly he calculated time: rate of Bruce's blood loss against rate of temperature drop against time since they had been trapped. Clark should have found them by now. Bruce had maybe a half-hour window left here, in which to be found. 

He tried to control his body's shivers. Bruce was watching him. "Arms under me," he said.

"What?"

"Slide your arms under the cape, next to my skin. It will warm you enough to keep you alive."

"Okay," he said, and scooted closer. He slid his hands in between the strange silk of the cape and the warm tautness of Bruce's abdomen. He could feel a bit of hair. Yep, just hanging out, resting his hands on Batman's happy trail. No big. Cue the inappropriate boner.

"Closer," Bruce said. "You won't hurt me on that side."

Hal scooted in further. This was pretty much a full-on snuggle now, there was no denying it. Bruce had lifted his right arm and looped it around Hal's waist. "You're the one bleeding out," Hal said, through his shivers. He was pleased to feel that the tremors in Bruce's muscles were subsiding. 

"Yes," Bruce replied. "I estimate twenty minutes."

"I was giving it half an hour. You're strong."

"I lost more blood than you know."

"You should have goddamn said something." 

"I was trying to control the pain."

"Stupid," Hal said. "Which I know I've said before. But how stupid can you get."

"Says the man who once tried to go up against Darkseid with a broken arm," Bruce murmured, and there was a sleepy slur in his voice that jolted Hal. He shook him slightly. 

"Nuh uh, no you don't, stay with me. Hey, I know. Let's talk about stuff. Okay? Stay with me. I'm bound to say something stupid, and you'll want to be awake to tell me about it."

"You're not stupid. You just forget that sometimes."

"Jesus, you really must be dying." 

Bruce made a sound that at first alarmed him, until he figured out it wasn't a choke or a convulsion, but an attempt at a laugh. So far, so good. "Want me to tell you about the day I took the SAT? I could tell you that story. I was actually stoned. True story, I took the test that would decide my whole future while completely baked. Bet you couldn't have predicted that one."

"Idiot," Bruce said.

"I know, right? But it wasn't completely my fault. I had to spend the night at my buddy Rory's house, because I had to be at the testing center at 8 AM, which meant I needed the cross-town bus by 7:15, which meant connecting from Hayesvillle. Couldn't make it on time if I stayed at our place. We did have a car, but this was one of those times when Amber had wrecked it—hydroplaned while drunk off her ass, totaled the whole thing. So I had to stay at Rory's." He lifted his head. "You awake?"

"Mm. Rory. Fascinating." 

"Rory wasn't taking the SAT because Rory had already doubled down on the exciting career of small-time weed dealer. He also dealt a little bit of coke on the side, and when he did coke he got violent, and when he got violent you had to smoke with him. So the night before the SAT I was blazing it with Rory Hartnell, hoping he would mellow enough so he wouldn't require beating the crap out of someone, which became a necessary thing after he'd done a couple of rails. Anyway, I got like three hours sleep and woke up still high as balls. Made it on time though."

"You got a perfect math score. . . while high," Bruce said. 

"Probably did better than if I'd been sober. Rory probably saved my ass. I should track him down and thank him. Son, the United States Air Force and the Justice League of America would like to shake your hand." 

Bruce's laugh this time was a small gust of air. "On the theory that every organization of which you are a member is so damn grateful."

"Something like that. Come on, tell me your SAT story."

"I don't have one."

"Come on, you must have something."

"Not really. I took it, I didn't spend the night at a junkie's house, and I don't remember my scores." 

"Well, that last part's probably a lie. But you're dying, I'll let it go by. I bet you were a piece of work, as an eighteen-year-old. If you're a paranoid fascist asshole now, I can't even imagine what you were like then."

"It's not paranoia if people are actually trying to kill you."

"What, you mean the giant purple aliens shooting at us? In my job, we call that Tuesday. Bruce. Come on, wake up."

"'M awake. Who's Amber?"

"Amber is. . . no one. Amber is nobody, forget it."

Bruce turned his head to Hal, scraping it against the stone. Their heads were on a level, and his face was maybe four inches away. "My mother," he said. "I never told anyone. When I got home the night she was killed, there were brain parts on my shirt. It was hers, because she was the only one who got hit in the head. I didn't know what to do with the shirt. I hid it in my drawer for about a year, until Alfred found it."

"Yeah," Hal said. "Sorry your mom got shot in the head. Not all of us were that lucky."

"Tell me another story."

"Okay," Hal said, racking his brain. The temp had dropped at least another four degrees. Bruce's skin was stretched white across his cheekbones. Goddammit, Clark had to find them now. "A story. Okay."

"Tell me about the girls in the movie theaters, with the bras."

"Oh," Hal said. "Sure. Well, which one? It was kind of a revolving door. You know me. Girls everywhere, all the time. Can't keep 'em off of me."

Bruce's eyes were large and near and knowing. "I won't be able to stay conscious much longer," he said.

"No," Hal said. "No, come on, Bruce, stay with me. You're not gonna leave me here. When Clark gets here and you're dead, guess who gets the blame? Think what this will look like for me."

"Sorry," he slurred, his eyelids slipping closed. Hal seized his jaw.

"No," he said through gritted teeth. "Man up here, Bruce."

"I don't. . . I can't. . ." The heavy head was tipping forward, resting against his. "First time I saw you," he murmured, and stopped.

"What? What about the first time you saw me?"

"Don't. . . remember."

"Yes you do. Tell me. Come on, stay with me, tell me about it. You thought I was cute, right? You can tell me."

"No," Bruce whispered. "I thought. . . you were. . . beautiful. . ." The head couldn't stay upright any more, and rolled onto his shoulder.

"No. No no no no no. Wake up, Bruce, come on, please, don't do this, for fuck's sake—" And he grabbed Bruce by the shoulders and shook him, who cared how much pain he was causing him, and roared his rage and frustration. "Bruce! Bruce, _fuck_ you, what are you—"

He lowered him to the floor, feeling desperately at his neck for a pulse, but there was none, feeling for breath, but it had stopped, and Hal threw back his head and screamed his rage, and the noise of his fury crashed the walls surrounding them and crumbled the rock and tore the foundations of the cave. His rage was red, with blazing bright eyes. Only then it was green, and there was green pulsing all around him, and he realized what had happened—Superman had cut through the rock, had sliced through the dampening field, and now, fucking NOW, he had his powers back, NOW when it was absolutely too goddamn fucking late to be of any fucking good—

His scream of rage tore straight upward through the miles of rock, encased in a solid shield of green, at what terrifying breakneck speed he never knew, and he had heard, he had read that it was possible for some Lanterns to break the sound barrier when they poured all their will into the ring, and when he looked back on it, that was the only explanation for how he had managed to zoom them both to the Watchtower, slicing through space like a hot green knife, before he was aware of making the decision or even knew where he was going, the only sound in his ears the roar of his own fury.

* * *

League meetings were hella strange, after that.

For one thing, they were like they always were—Superman would say some incredibly do-gooding, boring shit, and Batman would say some incredibly paranoid boring shit, and then a couple of people would argue over which way they wanted to get bored to death this week, and the whole time Hal was just hoping for some intergalactic space emergency that would require his immediate attention. And maybe quarantine, for about six months. 

But on the other hand, meetings weren't at all the same. They weren't the same, because he would glance at the head of the table—yeah, figure that one out, that a round table somehow still managed to have a head—and he would see Batman, but he couldn't unsee Bruce, behind that stiff black armor. He couldn't unknow the look of Bruce's eyes. He had always thought they were just very pale blue, but they weren't—they were actually gray, flecked with a touch of cobalt blue around the iris. Most times at League meetings, he had the lenses up on his cowl, and for all Hal knew he was napping behind there. But sometimes the lenses were open. 

Once, Bruce caught him looking. He had been studying Bruce for a while, and then Bruce turned—just a small motion of his head, which was leaning on his fist—and looked at Hal. Hal dropped his eyes in confusion, irritated at having been caught looking. But Bruce didn't look away; Bruce just kept looking at him, that steady impenetrable gaze. 

"You saved his life," Clark had said, later that night after their rescue, or later that day—he lost track of time for a while there, while Bruce was in surgery. "Bruce is going to pull through. Thanks to you, Dr. Thompkins says. You slowed the bleeding and kept him warm until we could get to him. Thank you, Hal." 

And Clark had put a hand on his shoulder— warm, friendly, kind. Hal had wanted to chew it off at the wrist. "You should go home and get some rest," Clark had said. "He's going to be fine."

"Right," Hal had said. "Well. Will you tell him—" And then he couldn't think of anything. Not a thing. "Never mind," he had amended. 

So obviously, the thing to do was to chalk the whole weird episode up to severe blood loss, on Bruce's part, not to mention internal hemorrhaging. Bruce certainly had done just that. Bruce didn't think twice about it, that much was obvious. He had never said word one to Hal about it—not so much as a thank you (which he really wasn't looking for, because it had in fact been Clark who had saved both their asses, not him) or even a shared backslap of _well, we made it out of that one_. 

Because he hated Bruce, that much was clear. Could not stand the bastard. And Bruce—well, Bruce could barely stand to be in the same room as him. They weren't even friends. Occasional partners, maybe. They did work well together, when Bruce could get past his enormous ego. And, well, okay, maybe when he could get past his own. But it was a working relationship, nothing more. They definitely did not like each other. Did they? Did. . . he?

_I thought you were beautiful._

That part had definitely been the blood loss. _You're too damn bright_ , was the first thing Bruce had ever said to him. And the expression on his face had been somewhere between a wince and a grimace. _I thought you were beautiful._

Sometimes, at League meetings, those five words would beat in his head. And then he would look up and find that Bruce was a blank wall of indifference sitting six feet away, and he would realize he was being an idiot. 

One day, when he looked up, he discovered that Bruce was already looking at him. Just steadily looking, and not looking away. Hal was the one who had to find somewhere else to look, because apparently Bruce was not so much with the nuances of social eye contact. At the end of the meeting, Hal got up first and strode quickly away. He might have known he wouldn't escape, though, because when he rounded the next corridor he heard the low, authoritative, "Lantern."

He stopped. Batman was stalking toward him like Vader on a starship inspection, the kind of inspection where at least five people ended up strangled. "I have something for you," he said.

"Okay," Hal said warily.

Batman—Bruce—held out a blank white envelope. "Inside," he said, "are a couple of things I thought you might want to take a look at."

"All right. Um." He glanced at the envelope. "I. . . will, thanks." And Batman was gone, in a swirl of foreboding black, without a backward glance.

Gingerly Hal opened the envelope. There were two folded papers inside. He pulled out the first. It was a business letter. He read the header, and stood frozen. It was addressed to a Mr. Rory David Hartnell, care of Kentucky State Department of Corrections. Hal stood with his heart thudding in his chest, because Jesus Christ. 

_Mr. Hartnell_ , (it read)

_While we have never met, I hope you won't be offended if I take this opportunity to send you a thank you letter._

_I'm sure you have no idea what this is for, but about fifteen years ago you did an act of kindness for a friend of mine. You didn't intend for it to be a kindness; in fact, you did everything in your power at the time to make his life even harder than it already was, but the fact remains, you did a simple thing for him that made possible all the good things that later happened in his remarkable life. I should be clear, my friend made those good things happen. He is unbelievably determined and stubborn, and if you hadn't been there to help him, he would still have found a way to get the life he wanted._

_That life has been at the service of those who need his help. He has laid his life on the line in the service of his country and his fellow man more times than I will ever be aware of, and done it without question and without (much) thought of personal gain. He is one of the most brilliant men I have met, but more importantly, he is one of the best men I have ever had the privilege to know, and I am proud to call him my friend._

_In his honor, I would like to extend a simple offer to you. It is my understanding that in sixteen weeks, you will have served out your sentence for possession and dealing of narcotics, as well as possession of unlicensed firearms and simple battery. If you present yourself at the address of the Wayne Foundation below, there is a job waiting for you. It is not a glamorous job. It is not a prestigious job. It is a job that entails hard work and regular hours. But it is a job that pays a living wage, with solid benefits. It is a job a man could be proud to have, the sort of job that would allow you to rebuild your life._

_Take my offer, or leave it. There is no expiration date on this offer, but I hardly need to point out it is to your advantage to take it as soon as possible._

_Yours sincerely,  
Bruce Wayne_

 

Hal leaned against the sleek metal wall because his knees wouldn't hold him up any longer. He shut his eyes. Jesus, Jesus Christ. Bruce remembered everything. Bruce remembered the whole thing, everything they had said. Bruce would do this. . . this thing for him. He looked again at the letter, and re-read the parts that were about him, with a weird clenching sensation in his throat. That was what Bruce thought about him.

With shaking fingers he pulled out the second sheet of paper, and squinted at it incredulously. It was from the College Board. It was a copy of. . . Bruce Wayne's SAT scores. Hal laughed out loud. A tech maintenance worker walking past gave him a curious look. Hal stuffed both papers in the envelope and headed to the living quarters. Something told him Bruce had not zeta'ed right back to earth. Something told him Bruce would wait. Bruce wouldn't obtrude, or press. This was what Bruce would do. He was beginning to figure out this strange, wonderful man. 

He placed his hand on the security pad of Bruce's quarters, knowing it would admit him. He walked into Bruce's room, knowing Bruce would be standing there waiting for him—knowing, too, the cowl would be pushed back, and there would be on his complicated face the complicated blend of emotions Hal was learning to read, and which he hoped to get better at. 

"You," Hal said, and he caught the twitch of muscle that meant apprehension. He shook the envelope in Bruce's face. "You," he said again. "Perfect math _and_ verbal? Really? Because you just couldn't let that go by?"

"Evidently," Bruce said with a wry tilt to his mouth.

"I was _stoned_ ," he said. "And _poor_! Excuse me if I couldn't remember the meaning of concomitant!"

"Cry me a river," Bruce said, and the twist of his mouth was so delicious this time that Hal had to kiss it. He kissed it hard, and he kissed it inelegantly, and he pressed his hand to the back of Bruce's neck and basically devoured his mouth. Bruce made a small noise in his throat that went straight to Hal's balls, and Hal pulled quickly away.

Bruce frowned like maybe he had done something wrong. "It's fine," Hal said. "It's just that I told myself on the way over here I wasn't coming here to fuck you, and I need to stop kissing you before I forget that." 

"Oh," Bruce said. He sounded a little disappointed.

"Dinner," Hal said. "I'd like to take you to dinner."

"All right. Will there be fucking after that?"

"Not a fan of taking things slow, I guess?"

"We've waited long enough," Bruce said. "I've waited long enough. Hal." And he put a hand on Hal's face, brushed his lips against Hal's, and then Hal was being kissed so hard he felt it down his spine. And some places lower than that, even. 

"Beautiful," Hal groaned.

**Author's Note:**

> This work has a sequel, [Aftermath](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1402366).


End file.
